Sydney Boys High School

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Occassional Address: Speech Night 2010

Occasional Address by Mr John Pilger to Sydney Boys High School at the Annual
Prize Giving and Speech Night Held on 16 February 2010

Thank you Dr. Jaggar, and to all of you for giving me the honour of
presenting the prizes tonight. It’s very strange for me to be standing on this
stage where I last stood in 1957 as a member of the Sydney High First VIII that
had just won the GPS Head of the River. I was so proud. Why? We had shown that
Sydney High, a state school, could deploy the determination and skill, the
spirit and intelligence that have nothing to do with money and privilege, and
everything to with a commitment that is human endeavour at its boldest. Most of
our supporters on the river bank were not finely-dressed. They did not drive
smart cars. They weren’t always confident and assured. But they represented the
way we were.

When we won, my dad’s best mates, a taxi driver and a bookie, celebrated in
the pub. They didn’t care so much about the Head-of-the-River. They cared that
Sydney High had won.

That’s why being here tonight means so much to me.

I was not a successful student. History alone fired my imagination, thanks to
one fine teacher. Maths and science were sent to torment me. What saved me from
delinquency was the very idea of Sydney High, its sense of community – parents,
old boys, supporters – and the way High was admired in the wider community.

For me, this translated into lifelong friends and a comradeship expressed
mostly in rowing, which instilled an attitude of all-for-one-and-one-for-all.

That was my launch pad, my beginning.

Yes, High is an elite school – it comes eighth in the government’s new league
tables. But that’s not why it’s extraordinary.

Secondary public education in New South Wales was pioneered at Sydney High,
and today when international visitors drive into Sydney from the airport, past
Moore Park, they glimpse a school where the amazing diversity of Australia is
represented, and celebrated.

As this country has changed its Anglo-Irish characteristics for a nation
drawn from all corners of the earth, Sydney High, along with other state
schools, has led the way.

But an elite status carries responsibilities. It’s not enough to turn out
brilliant passes in the HSC. There is an obligation upon all of you to
understand and speak out on issues that affect the wider community.

Issues like why Australia goes to war in countries that do not threaten us.

Issues like the way our governments treats refugees who struggle to reach our
shores.

Issues like education.

The federal government’s recent publication of school league tables is an
attack on our wider community – on the ‘fair go’ that is said to be at the heart
of Australia.

As people rush to find out how their school rates, the hidden message of
these lists is one of division and hopelessness to many young people and their
families not fortunate enough to be at a school like Sydney High.

For example, I looked up the primary school I attended – in Wellington
Street, Bondi. It rated No. 564 out of 1100.

Wellington Street Bondi is not fashionable. It never was. The parents of kids
who go there often have to struggle.

However, not far away, Bondi Beach Primary is fashionable. Middle class
parents fight to get their offspring in. And it’s more than 400 points up the
list from Wellington Street.

In the West of Sydney schools that have the responsibility of teaching
students with English as a second language, and dealing with the poverty that
inevitably comes with refugees, find themselves way down in the list.

In the country, Boggabilla is near the bottom of the list. Its students come
from the indigenous community: the First Australians.

According to a recent United Nations report on 90 countries, the Aboriginal
people of Australia are so disadvantaged they have the worst life expectancy of
any indigenous people in the world.

That’s shocking, isn’t it?

What will happen now to schools like Boggabilla that are named and shamed?

The students, teachers and parents, for all their efforts, are not supposed
to feel proud, are they? Now perhaps they will feel more alienated from the
Australian community than ever -- as a campaign of attrition is mounted against
so-called failed schools, forcing some of them eventually to close.

Those of us who care about education and a fair go should ask:

What is the real aim of these lists? Is it ideological?

Is it to cut back state education and harness teachers to a dictated
curriculum? Is it to undermine the solidarity of teachers? Is it to replace a
democratic system with a corporate version?

I have watched this happen in the UK and the United States, disastrously. The
media in both countries has been used to pressure schools into becoming small
businesses. The same may happen in Australia unless we are vigilant.

Moreover, this naming and shaming is a distraction from the fact – the
scandalous fact -- that the government bankrolls private schools at the expense
of public schools.

A wealthy private school like Knox Grammar gets an aquatic centre and smart
boarding facilities, largely courtesy of the taxpayer -- while the poorest
schools, like Boggabilla, beg for funds for a library.

By 2012, Australian taxpayers will have given $1.2 billion more to private
schools than to the schools where the majority of our children are educated.

This is morally wrong. It has no place in the Land of Fair Go.

We must defend a well-resourced public education system that provides
opportunity for all youngsters, regardless of income, race and class. There’s
nothing more precious in a democracy.

Without it, I wouldn’t be standing here tonight, and you wouldn’t be
celebrating your achievements.

Without it, the esteem and confidence of our youngsters would be on sale to
the highest bidder.

Let me quote you the words of the great American historian and teacher Howard
Zinn, who has just died.

Professor Zinn was a champion of public education. His great textbook, A
People’s History of the United States challenged the propaganda of established
power that said democracy is handed down from the top, not fought for and won by
the people, by us.

“I wanted my students,” he wrote, “to leave my classes not just better
informed, but more prepared to relinquish the safety of silence, more prepared
to speak up, to act against injustice wherever they saw it. This, of course, was
a recipe for trouble.”

In offering all of you my congratulations on your achievements at Sydney
High, I urge to go into the world and leave the safety of silence -- to speak up
and act against injustice wherever you find it, and to make trouble –
remembering that the most important trouble is calling to account those who
assume power over our lives.

Always question, always stand your ground and, above all, be brave.

For those of you who may not be coming up to get a prize tonight, remember
that success in future life doesn’t necessarily come from prizes. Neither does
it come from endless testing.

What’s important, above all, is the person you are, the kindness you express,
the compassion you feel, and the courage and wisdom you show at every step along
the way.

And may I add this personal note. It’s fifty one years since Sydney High won
the Head of the River.

High boys today are as capable and lion-hearted as we were. All they need is
help, as we needed it. Surely it’s time.